Wednesday, August 29, 2012

Six ways to make volatility your friend

This article from Accenture discuss how to increase the company agility in order to stay ahead of the competition. If you don´t have the time to read it, just browse through the twelve-point checklist and see how your company have prepared for rough times:



  • Does your organization have at least three scenarios for how your industry is most likely to evolve over the next 36 months? Does it have good options for responding?
  • What three big opportunities would your company be pursuing if it were more agile?
  • Imagine three possible sources of competition that you haven’t thought would be likely until now. How will you respond to them?
  • Put yourself in your top competitors’ shoes. What could they do to disrupt the market in the next year, and what are your plans for outsmarting them?
  • How is your company augmenting its ability to quickly sense new market anomalies? Are you taking full advantage of the new capabilities of today’s analytics tools?
  • What are the three biggest factors preventing your organization from being more agile? How do you plan to overcome them?
  • Did you make such big cuts during the recession (particularly in terms of talent) that your agility and ability to grow have been damaged? If so, how are you compensating now for those cuts?
  • In what areas should you be collaborating with your competitors to drive changes in the market?
  • Who among your organization’s new leaders will be most effective at taking advantage of volatility? What makes them different from your longtime leaders?
  • Which of your customers are the best leading indicators of future market opportunities?
  • Where would faster decision making be of most benefit to your company?
  • Have you been able to cut your company’s fixed costs in the past few years to improve its agility?"
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